The Clarity Blend
by Laura Schiller
Summary: A Bluebird Tea Shop story, companion to "Closing Time". "Serve with milk or cream, and when the mist clears from the cup, your decision should be made." I/R.
1. Chapter 1

The Clarity Blend

By Laura Schiller

Based on: Tokyo Mew Mew

Copyright: Reiko Yoshida, Mia Ikumi

Part 1

"Late again, eh, Strawberry?"

Ichigo jumped. She could practically hear the wry smile in Shirogane Ryou's voice, and when she turned around, sure enough, there it was. He leaned against the kitchen doorframe, his arms folded, one strand of golden hair falling teasingly over his tanned forehead. His black sleeveless shirt stood out like a spill of ink against the pink walls.

"By one _minute_," she retorted.

"Hey, that's right. Must be a new record."

"Oh c'mon," she joked, flapping her hand at him. "You know I'm the best waitress you've got. What I'm missing in punctuality, I make up for in attitude. Now tell me how this looks."

She gestured at the display she'd just finished setting up: pale yellow cheesecakes alternating with dark chocolate, plain shortbread next to ornate towers of icing. The empty package from the Bluebird Tea Shop still sat on the counter, its contents arranged according to the colors of the rainbow: apple cinnamon, orange pekoe, lemon, jasmine green tea, peppermint and lavender. The plain black and green teas, in their more subdued indigo, silver and black sachets, were on the lower shelf. Ichigo loved bright colors and quirky environments, and the Café Mew Mew had both. _"A little bit much, isn't it?", _had been Aoyama-kun's cautious comment on the miniature castle design, heart-shaped chairs and cotton-candy-colored walls, but since she couldn't be a movie star or an artist, this was by far the best substitute she could imagine.

"Too crowded," was Shirogane's verdict. "No more than three cakes on every shelf. They'll disappear soon enough, and then you can bring the others."

"Geez … " But she grabbed the surplus cakes anyway and bustled off with them, balancing two in the crook of her arm with the ease of long practice. She came dangerously close to brushing up against Shirogane, who moved away just in time. His cologne smelled of cinnamon. She avoided his eyes.

"What about now?" she asked brusquely as she reemerged.

He held up camera hands, gazed through them with alert turquoise eyes, and nodded. "Nice," he said.

Ichigo felt a rush of warmth. That was the thing about Shirogane: he was straightforward. He'd tell you, sometimes in completely unnecessary detail, what you were doing wrong, but when he gave a compliment, he meant it. After fifteen years of _"Anything you like, Ichigo"_ from Aoyama-kun, Shirogane's firm opinions were like a life preserver thrown to a drowning woman.

_Don't be ridiculous, _she told herself, scowling at her reflection in the sparkling-clean display case. _You're not drowning._

"What's this?" Shirogane picked something up from the bottom of the delivery package, turned it over, and passed it back to Ichigo. "We didn't order this. Did you?"

"No."

"It's got your name on it."

"It's not mine."

It was another tea sachet, stamped with the shop's eponymous blue bird. Aizawa's mark, only used for her own personal blends. _Clarity_, said the label._ Serve with milk or cream, and when the mist clears in the cup, your decision should be made._

Attached to it was a sky-blue Post-It note which read: _For the personal use of Momomiya Ichigo-san. _

Ichigo swallowed a gasp. She remembered her last time with Aoyama-kun at the shop, the few terse remarks between them – _"English Breakfast again?""Of course." "Can't we get that at the supermarket?" _– and Aizawa Mint's beady brown eyes following them from behind the counter. How much did the woman know? Did she know that on the night of her twenty-eighth birthday party, Shirogane had taught Ichigo to waltz and brought her iced cider to cool her blushing face? And did she know about the envelope crinkling in Ichigo's apron pocket at this very moment, the one addressed to a manga publisher and signed with the pseudonym "Miyu Koneko"?

"You okay?" asked Shirogane. "You look a little spaced out."

"I'm fine!" she squeaked. "Fine. I just … it's a little weird, that's all. You know they say that woman at the Bluebird's some kind of witch?"

"Don't tell me you believe in that crap." He raised an eyebrow at her, and she drew herself up proudly to meet the challenge.

"Just because you can't prove something, doesn't mean it's crap."

"Similarly, it doesn't make it true. You have to admit she's odd. Talks like a Jane Austen character, and thinks she can tell all her customers how to run their lives. I don't need to drink tea to keep my head on straight, thank you very much."

"You might if that head gets any bigger."

"Oh, and you'd know all about that." He snorted. "Miss I-make-up-for-it-with-attitude."

"_I _don't pretend to know everything. We all need advice from someone every now and again. That's what people like Aizawa-san are for."

"Does that mean you're going to drink it?" He waved the Clarity in front of her face. She batted it away.

"Wha – ? No! Why would I?"

"Why wouldn't you, if you think she's so useful?"

Flustered by his smirk and the intensity of his ocean-blue gaze, she realized she had just talked herself into a corner. How did he always do this – play devil's advocate with her until she did the very thing she was most afraid of?

"Fine." She snatched the tea away and stuffed it into her apron pocket. "But only if we share. If I prove to you that Bluebird tea is magic, I get the afternoon off."

"And if you don't? Or should I say, _when_ you don't?"

She swallowed. "I'll work a double shift."

"Brave words, Strawberry," said Shirogane, holding out his hand. She shook it firmly, trying to ignore he jolt of electricity between them. "Today, after hours. Just you, me, and some hot water. Now c'mon, we're opening."

"Yes, _sir._" She saluted him mockingly, flounced away, and went to flip the sign on the front door.

This was the same tactic he had used to get her to publish the cartoons he'd caught her scribbling on the backs of menus. Her first royalty check had given her such a rush. It didn't feel right to keep the secret from Aoyama-kun - but really, a manga series about a waitress who transformed into a mutant cat girl to fight aliens? He'd think it was ridiculous. He'd never tell her to her face, but he would _look_ it, and that would be worse. He was the best of men, dedicated to teaching, helping the environment, and making her happy; her knight in shining armor since she was thirteen. Imagination, however, had never been his strong suit.

She finished writing down the day's special on the chalkboard, dusted off her hands, and fished a little pink cell phone out of her pocket.

_Working l8 2nite_, she texted to Aoyama-kun, who would be in the middle of teaching his senior class by now. _DK how long. Dont wait up._

She half hoped for a question mark, even a complaint: _He's working you too hard_, perhaps, or _I miss our evenings. _His reply, though, when it came during his recess, was: _OK. _


	2. Chapter 2

Part 2

_Uh-oh,_ thought Ichigo at the end of her shift. _Looks like I'm going to lose that bet after all. _Her portion of Clarity, delicious as it was – a hot black jolt of caffeine that really needed milk to get it down – was more than half empty, and all she and Shirogane had managed to talk about was her manga series. He had helped her add some conflict among the team of heroines (_"Don't tell me you never fight with your best friends_"), fine-tuned the characterization of the villains (_"No one's evil just for evil's sake, come on!"_) and even worked out a semi-logical explanation for the heroines' short skirts (_"They need to be aerodynamic, don't they?"_). She hadn't laughed so much, or felt so energized, since her last karaoke night with Moe and Miwa. Still, it was beginning to be obvious that Aizawa Mint was nothing but a very clever saleswoman after all.

"I'm still stuck on the ending," Ichigo admitted. "I mean, obviously they beat the aliens and take back the planet, but I'm a little fuzzy on the details."

"Hmm. What about Rose? Have you decided yet who she'll end up with?"

Ichigo sighed and swirled her cup, in which the milk fog had cleared much faster than her own mind. Rose was her heroine, her favorite, and if she was honest, endowed with more than a few of her own characteristics. Including her signature color.

"With … with Yamada-kun, of course," she said. "Who else?"

Shirogane snorted. "Gee, Strawberry, how cliché can you get?"

"Yamada Masahiro is not a cliché," she fired back. "He's a gentleman."

"Same thing."

"He respects her. He treats her like a lady."

"But she's not a lady, is she?"

"What's that supposed to mean?" Ichigo bristled in her character's defense. Of course working in a café wasn't the classiest of jobs, but the manager of one had no business looking down on it.

"She's better than that. She's a badass cat woman on the front lines of an interplanetary war. The way to respect a girl like that is to be honest with her. No cotton wool. No keeping big chunks of your identity a secret until she finds out by accident."

Ichigo huffed out a frustrated breath. Why did he have to be so smart? He knew her characters almost better than she did, which, under different circumstances, would have made her indescribably happy.

"So tell me, Mr. Plot Genius, who would _you _pick for her? Ryan?"

"Yeah. Why not?"

Ichigo choked on a mouthful of tea, then coughed and spluttered as he leaned back in his chair and watched her with a sardonic twist at the corner of his mouth.

Somehow, she didn't know why or when, Rose's scenes with the brusque American scientist who'd given her the mutation had become her favorite scenes to draw. The ballroom scene; walking in on a shirtless Ryan in his room; the revelation that he'd tested the mutation serum on himself first, becoming a fierce little tomcat who could relate to Rose's own animal side like no one else; the story of his parents' deaths. She'd been inspired by Akasaka's stories about the house fire that had killed the Shiroganes, leaving the young patissier in custody of an eight-year-old boy who _"faced the loss with the courage of a grown man"_.

"Because he's her boss, that's why," she snapped. "It just wouldn't be appropriate."

"At least _they_ have chemistry together." Shirogane leaned forward, his eyes flashing, and Ichigo cursed her tendency to blush. The memory of his strong arm around her waist at that birthday party flared to the front of her mind. _Chemistry. God. What am I, a hormonal teenager?_

"Chemistry isn't everything."

"No, but it's a whole lot."

"Ugh!" She tugged at her dyed pink pigtails, too frustrated to give a reasonable answer, then grew even more frustrated by the depth of her own feelings about these fictional characters. Why couldn't she calm down? Why did Shirogane do this to her? She hadn't fought like this with anyone since … since …

Aoyama-kun. The earthquake at the amusement park. The falling rubble, the screams, his sweaty hand slipping out of hers, the crowd tearing her away like a tidal wave. His torn jacket and furious dark eyes when he found her again.

"_Goddamnit, Ichigo! Where did you go?"_

"_I got lost in the crowd, okay?"_

"_You scared me half to death! Is it too much to ask you to watch where you're going?"_

"_I told you it's not my fault, stop yelling at me!"_

Aoyama-kun had lost control because he loved her and was afraid of losing her. He'd apologized profoundly, of course, not seeming to realize that once they were over the shock, his outburst was the best thing that could have happened to them. How many times had she wished since then for him to be just a little bit less of a gentleman, a little more human? But how ungrateful was that, when she knew that countless women would do anything for someone like him?

But now, it was Shirogane Ryou who made her angry. Angry, amused, embarrassed, exhilarated, inspired and so many things besides. That had to mean …

_Oh no._

The Clarity tea was kicking in at last.

"We're not really talking about Rose and Ryan, are we?" she said in a very small voice.

"Thank God," said Shirogane, almost as softly. "I was starting to think you'd never say it."

She looked up, and all the love she had fought so hard to deny was shining in every line of his face. It was terrifying.

"Shirogane, I can't – we shouldn't … "

"Because you don't want me?" he said gruffly. "Is that it?"

"That's not it at all!"

"Hah. So you _do_ want me." He flashed that familiar smirk, but the sincere hope in his eyes cut her to the heart.

"I'm not a cheater," she said more firmly, clinging to the principles she had instilled in her heroine. "I'm not having an affair with you, and I … I can't leave Aoyama-kun. I couldn't stand to hurt him like that."

Or, quite possibly, _not_ hurt him. She didn't even know which would be worse.

"You know what'll hurt him?" said Shirogane bluntly, his knuckles turning white around the handle of his mug. "Pity from a woman who's got feelings for someone else. Guys aren't completely clueless about these things, you know, no matter what Hollywood movies say. He'll pick up on it soon, if he hasn't already, and then what? Ichigo, think about this!"

A plea entered his voice in those last words. He had never called her anything before but 'Momomiya' when he first hired her, or his particular English nickname of 'Strawberry'. The sound of her name on his lips was another jolt though her body.

She couldn't take it anymore.

"I – I'm sorry," she stuttered, jumping to her feet and knocking over her chair. "I've got to go. I need to think. I just – I'm sorry!"

"_Ichigo!"_

She ran for the back of the store as fast as she could go. Shirogane chased after her, but she slammed the changing-room door and locked it just in time.


	3. Chapter 3

Part 3

"My dear boy, you've barely touched your breakfast. Is anything the matter?"

Ryou looked up blearily from his salmon bagel and extra-black coffee into the kind brown eyes of Akasaka Keiichiro. That was the drawback, he found, to becoming co-manager to a man who was also one's godfather. It meant you couldn't get away from his affection and concern – even if you wanted to. Not even at four a.m., the ungodly hour reserved for restaurant owners who served breakfast. The sun wasn't even up yet; outside the November sky was blue as a fresh bruise, foregrounded by skeletons of trees.

"I'm fine." He picked up his bagel and took a demonstrative bite.

"Really." Keiichiro's tone was politely skeptical, the same he'd used on an eight-year-old Ryou who asked for a night-light _not_ because he had nightmares, but simply for decoration.

"Couldn't sleep, that's all."

"Ah … The dream again?"

"Not this time."

Keiichiro sighed into his strawberry cornflakes. _Strawberries. _Ryou looked past him at their tiny white apartment kitchen, so different from the spacious stainless-steel terrirory where his friend produced his excellent cakes. A long to-do list for the café was scribbled on the whiteboard stuck to the fridge: _Replace cracked tiles. Call plumber for men's bathroom. Health inspection, Wednesday, 10 PM. _Keiichiro had added to that, in red marker: _Be polite!_ Yesterday, that reminder had made Ryou smile. Today, he glared.

"You know," said Keiichiro, "For a man who prides himself on his candor, you can be terribly efficient at hiding your true feelings. Makes it very difficult for anyone trying to help you."

"What makes you think I need help?"

"What's poor Ichigo-san done this time?"

Ryou froze in his seat. He could feel the blood draining from his face.

"Ah." Keiichiro gave a tiny nod, like a scientist who saw his hypothesis confirmed.

"How did you – what makes you think - "

"She's our best worker, and you know it. Moe-san and Miwa-san pay more attention to us than to the customers, and Pudding-san smashed an entire plate set with her circus trick the other day. But still, Ichigo-san is the one you constantly complain about, and all because she occasionally comes in late … and yet, not only have you _not_ fired her, but you cannot seem to keep out of her way."

Ryou bowed his head in defeat. There was no getting anything past Keiichiro.

"I'm an idiot," he said brusquely. "But then, so is she. And when I _tried _to talk to her, come to some kind of understanding, she ran away from me like I was one of the freaking aliens in her manga."

Keiichiro finished his cornflakes, went to place his bowl in the dishwasher with customary precision, and paused on his way to put a cool hand on his godson's shoulder.

"Give her some space," was his advice. "Let her work things out on her own. She'll come back to you when she's good and ready."

_Typical, _he thought sourly. _Do nothing and everything will be fine. _He honestly didn't know if he could last the time it took for Ichigo to make up her mind without breaking something. Preferably Aoyama Masaya's nose.

_Damn. Damn, damn, damn. _He brooded over it in silence while he and Keiichiro cleared the breakfast dishes and headed downstairs, the older man to begin the morning's baking, the younger man to take care of the electronic paperwork. _Why did I have to tell her? Even if she brought it up first? We were fine the way we were, and then everything just …_

Okay, so they hadn't been fine. At least he hadn't. Not a day went by that he didn't regret approving Keiichiro's uniform choice, since the sight of Ichigo's swaying hips in that short red skirt and frilly petticoat had done nothing for his peace of mind. But it was more than that; it was her sass, her sense of humor, the ferocious energy she brought to everything from mopping the floors to campaigning for a pay raise. He felt too old for his thirty-odd years sometimes, tired of the monotony of bookkeeping, advertising, dealing with health inspectors and food critics who all seemed to have it in for his little café. Ichigo made him feel young again, younger than he had since a gas leak and a hot California wind had burned his childhood away.

How were they supposed to look each other in the face after this?

The morning went on; the other three staff members arrived in a swirl of giggles, aprons and bouncing hair; the smell of coffee and baking pervaded every room. Ryou began to perspire under his sweater. What was taking Ichigo so long? And was she only late as usual, or - ?

A knock at his office door almost made him delete his monthly accounts as his hand slipped on the mouse.

"I'm busy," he said.

"Oh. Um. Should I come back later?"

He shot up from his chair and flung the door open. There stood Momomiya Ichigo, scarlet-faced, dressed in a light green sweater and jeans instead of her uniform, and holding out an envelope in both hands.

"It's my - my resignation letter," she said. "I quit."


	4. Chapter 4

Part 4

There was a long and painful pause as Ryou struggled to find something to say. Something that didn't sound too cavemanlike, such as _Don't you dare!_ or hopelessly pathetic, such as _Please don't leave me, I couldn't take it. _She looked up at him with wide gray eyes, visibly apprehensive, though he wasn't sure why. What did she expect him to do, grab her by the hair and haul her back to his apartment?

"Give me a little more credit, Strawberry," he finally managed to say, with some rough approximation of his usual dry tone. "If this is about the incident yesterday, don't worry. Surely we can work together and still keep our hands off each other. We're both grownups, aren't we? Or at least I am."

"Shut up!" she growled.

Annoyed was better than terrified, anyway.

"I'm trying to tell you – okay, before you say anything, sit down and don't interrupt me. God, I can't tell you how long I've wanted to say that."

"Is that any way to talk to your boss?" he said, fighting back a smile as he settled back in his swivel-chair.

"You're not my boss." She waved the letter triumphantly in front of him. "Not anymore."

"I haven't accepted it yet."

"What part of _don't interrupt me_ is so hard to understand?"

He folded his arms and waited for her in pointed silence.

"Thanks. Okay. So I thought about it," picking up the thread of their abruptly ended conversation the day before. "You know, about us. And, long story short, I … I'm back at my parents' place for now."

"You mean … ?" He didn't dare to hope yet, and in any case, it seemed unfeeling to be hopeful about the end of someone's relationship.

"I left him." The triumph on Ichigo's face faded into a quiet resignation. "You were right. If I'd put it off too long, it would've been so much worse. Still … it feels strange. Like growing a long ponytail for years and then cutting it all off." She rubbed the back of her neck, as if she had literally been freed of a weight and lost part of her body at the same time.

"Are you … okay?"

She shrugged. "Mostly."

"Is he okay?" Ryou didn't quite know why he found himself asking that, except that – if the past few any hours were any indication – the prospect of losing Ichigo was a nasty business, and he wouldn't wish it on anyone. Not even an environmentally conscious high school teacher with more virtues than were healthy.

"He was very … quiet," said Ichigo sadly. "Either he's in shock, or he doesn't really care. I don't think there was anything we could have done, though, him and me. We're just … not in middle school anymore."

"He's not the type to come after me with a sword, is he?"

She laughed a little. "No, not like in my manga. Oh, speaking of, that's something else I wanted to tell you. My agent called. And guess what? The first volume's selling like … like one of Akasaka-san's cheesecakes! Maybe even better."

"That's awesome!"

"Can you believe it?"

"If I say no, are you gonna whack me on the head with that envelope?"

She did it anyway, grinning now, her emotions in even more of a roller-coaster state than usual.

"She says at this rate, I can switch to drawing full-time! This is the best thing that could've happened to me – I mean, I love this place, but I don't want to be a waitress for the rest of my life, you know?"

"Oh, I know." He grinned back. Her energy was catching. Not only that, but he was beginning to feel more hopeful than he had since the very first time her eyes had darkened at his touch. If she had left Masaya, and her resignation was for such a very good reason, could it be possible … ?

"Besides," she added, would-be casually, but turning bright pink and bouncing a little on her toes. "I couldn't go hooking up with the guy who's responsible for my paycheck, now could I?"

It took him a while to translate that from Ichigo's own peculiar thought pattern into normal speech, but once he did, a swarm of sparkling fireworks seemed to explode inside his chest. Heat and light. He jumped up from his chair, swept Ichigo up in his arms, and did what he had been dreaming of for three frustrated years.

He kissed her.

It was better than cheesecake, better than chocolate. They seemed to melt together like butter in a pan, warm and golden, sizzling with anticipation. His hands slid through her satiny hair as she locked her fingers together at the back of his neck. He could feel every inch of her soft body pressed against him. If not for the necessity of breathing, he could have stayed like this for hours.

"I've got to say," he breathed against her mouth. "I've never been this happy to lose an employee."

She looked up at him with dreamy, half-lidded eyes. "I've never been this happy to lose a job."

He slid his hands along her arms, not wanting to stop touching her even when they stepped apart. "Define 'hooking up', though."

"What do you mean?"

"If you're looking for some kind of 'friends with benefits' arrangement, I'm afraid that's not going to work," he said, trying for coolness, which was somewhat undermined by his shortness of breath from their kiss. "I want the whole deal, Strawberry. Flowers, restaurant dinners, double dates with your friends, walking down the street like this," he squeezed one of her hands and swung it from side to side. "Don't worry," seeing the wide-eyed astonishment on her face, "I'm not asking you to marry me or anything like that. At least not now.But eventually, once the breakup gossip wears off, I do want the whole neighborhood to know you're mine."

Ichigo beamed, and he felt a rush of relief to realize he'd misread her. Her astonishment had been the happy kind.

"Well, of course I want a real relationship," she said, swatting him lightly on the shoulder. "What kind of girl do you think I am?"

"The kind that deserves clarity," he said, smiling back at her.

He thought of Keiichiro's remark only that morning: _You can be terribly efficient at hiding your true feelings. _His godfather had a point; he had come within an inch of losing her, all because he'd been sarcastic instead of showing her just how much he loved her. He didn't have to be sappy or melodramatic, that wasn't his nature; but he did need to be honest with her if this was going to work. She deserved nothing less.

"Good answer." She rose up on tiptoe and kissed him again. "Oh, and speaking of clarity … ?"

"Mmm, yes?"

Her smile of joy turned into something of a smirk. "I do believe I won our bet."

"What bet? Oh, you mean about the tea?"

"That's right. If we hadn't drunk that stuff together, none of this would have happened."

"Oh, really? Don't you think we owe most of that to our own natural charm?"

"C'mon," she scoffed. "I just handed you a perfect excuse to take the day off. Since I can't anymore, with the resignation and all."

"That's illogical. If you think I lost the bet – which I haven't, by the way – why should _I_ get the reward?"

"Who says it's not a reward for me?"

And without further ado, she linked arms with him and led him downstairs.


End file.
